


Duet for Two Hearts Not Yet Mended

by raedbard



Category: The West Wing
Genre: M/M, Porn Battle, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-08-01
Updated: 2008-08-01
Packaged: 2017-10-06 23:12:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/58779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raedbard/pseuds/raedbard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Josh runs into Toby in the downtown Barnes & Noble, everything gets a little complicated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Duet for Two Hearts Not Yet Mended

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Porn Battle VI, to the prompt 'Barnes &amp; Noble'.

Josh remembers a time when they wouldn't sell you coffee in bookshops. He was sleep-walking all the way to the corner of 12th and E until his feet stopped him at the door and demanded on behalf of a brain still occupied with midterms strategy some kind of liquid refreshment. He resists these demands for a few moments and stares up at the storefront: pale stone build and a half-dead tree to his right, and the lights inside yellow and star-like and snow underfoot. He could almost believe he was somewhere else, in another city. Except that D.C. tastes, smells and sounds to the senses of this Connecticut son, completely unlike New York. He's been dreaming about that city which is not his own a lot lately - fantasies full of monuments and bridges and a small brownstone of which he has only ever seen a single photograph. Josh shakes his head and blinks his eyes and shifts away from the gaze of a woman passing in the street who was obviously thinking: _what the hell is up with you?_ and resists the urge to shout after her: _creating US government policy takes up a lot of brain power, yanno!_ He smirks; she's probably heard that one a couple times before.

As soon as he walks in his senses are assaulted all over again - with cool air con, the power-selling 'aroma' of roasted Colombian coffee beans, the light, dry smell of new books and the peace of a bookshop late at night. Though he wouldn't like to admit as much to anyone, Josh has always numbered a quiet bookshop among his happy places and back when he was still lacking a diploma from Yale Law - back before coffee was hustled to you in badly-lit cafes near the World History section - he used to smuggle in a flask and his case notes and sit out of the way, trying to will knowledge into his brain. Josh grins.

He drifts around in fiction; coffee can wait a little while. Despite everyone else's advice Josh has always been the kind of man who judges a book by its cover, and he hates all of these. All the colours are garish, all the typefaces clumsy and smudged. And the prose inside, even his eye can tell is not an instrument for the edification of the American public. He sighs as he puts back one of the hardbacks on the New Releases table, pushing it slightly deeper into its place than is strictly necessary. And then he nearly knocks out the whole stand.

"I didn't know you read fiction, Josh."

His right hand tries to catch Tom Clancy and his left Karin Slaughter; it all ends in a six book pile-up at his feet and before he can make a start putting it back together a young female assistant has rushed over and pulled the books out of his hands with a _it's fine, Mister Lyman, don't worry about it_ and Josh is backing away, trying not to blush. It doesn't help when he looks up and finds that he didn't dream the voice that brought about the Great Destruction of Barnes and Noble: a voice at once bitter and velvet, that seems lower by half an octave than it was five years ago, that scratches at the back of his throat.

"Toby," he says.

"Hey. You wanna come away from there? I think she's ... well, I think she'd prefer if you stood well back."

"Yeah, er. Yeah. Sorry."

"You were supposed to be Sam's positive influence. I see that hasn't gone to plan."

Josh smiles, down into his scarf and collar. Toby wipes the smile out by pressing his hand, so gently, to the crook of Josh's elbow, guiding him away from the scene of chaos and towards the poorly-lit cafe which is next to Modern Poetry and not World History after all, just like a man might who once steered the steps of two children away from the oncoming traffic. Josh shivers.

Josh orders a macchiato without stopping to think; Toby asks, in a tone which informs the listener that there will be no further elaboration, for a black coffee. Josh could laugh right there, standing beside him, fumbling with change, watching the barista's expression change from bored to vengeful, watching Toby's expression stay exactly the same. There are two white streaks like thumbprints in his beard now, on either side of the round of his chin. His scarf is a dark red, his overcoat black. His eyes have, under the fluorescents, hardly any brown in them; hard black and glittering with a joke Josh wonders if he even knows he's made.

"I'm making friends all over again here," he says, as they find a table. Josh smiles, heart pounding. Of course he knows.

"What _are_ you doing here?"

"It's a professional engagement," Toby says, taking a sip of his coffee and staring at Josh over the rim.

"Yeah?"

"You didn't get around to demolishing my end of the fiction stock."

"Your end ... "

"Go have a look under 'Z'."

"Toby! You've ... you've written a book? Why didn't you ... why haven't I heard -- "

"Well I balanced it out, Josh. On the one hand, running the country; on the other reading a book that will sink without trace in -- " he looks, in a perfect display of Ziegler-esque sarcasm, at his watch, "In about six weeks."

"God."

"Yes, I have gone over to the dark side."

"Have you been, y'know, leaking secrets about the Dean of Columbia?"

He doesn't smile, but his eyes gleam with light, just for a moment, and Josh finds that the thin seam of self-hatred running black and thick as blood through his heart, has not burst. "No. This is a planned career change."

"We really don't do those."

"I never was one to go along with the majority, Josh."

Josh grins. "No." He takes a sip of coffee - still too hot - and asks The Question. "So, what's it about?"

"It's about Huck," Toby says. Two words and a name which shatters quietly on the table between them. Josh finds out that self-hatred is cold and numbing, turning his fingers slow and clumsy and his breathing shallow, like poison. Toby's eyes are brown under the fluorescents, and tender and quiet, no tears. And Josh doesn't know why he expected any different, here in the downtown Barnes and Noble, almost three years after.

*

The reading is exactly a week away - next Thursday night. Josh spends the intervening time drinking extremely strong coffee and sleeping extremely alone. Sam is the only one who asks: _are you and Donna okay?_ and since Josh has no idea what the answer to that question is, Sam doesn't get an answer. That he hides from both of them, switching directions in the corridors to escape a distant rhythm of footfalls he knows is his Deputy's and taking his lunch out to a bench in LaFayette Park to escape his fiancee's perfume and delicate, hurt silences. And not thinking about either of them, but about a small book bound in a quiet dark blue and set in a typeface which seems familiar and only smudges when he pulls his thumb over it. Neither of them know and though he didn't say so in as many words, Josh thinks Toby wants to keep it that way. Too much to explain, too many words that will only hurt. When Thursday evening comes and Sam suggests going out for an hour or two (_just to get the smell of this place off my clothes for a little while_) Josh has to shake his head.

"I've got somewhere I have to be. Sorry, man."

Sam frowns, just a little. "Yeah?"

Josh smiles. "I can't tell you."

Now he looks hurt, just around the creases by his eyes. "Okay."

"I'm sorry, Sam."

He nods. "Have a good time," he says, before he turns his back and walks away.

*

It isn't exactly a crowd. A few guys who look like they might have been Toby's colleagues on the English faculty in another life, a few college kids with their hands wrapped around coffee cartons like it's the stuff of life, and a few people of both genders who just look pleased to be in from the cold. Josh picks a seat at the back, sinks down into the chair with his collar up past his jawline, and waits. It doesn't take very long.

He looks: uncomfortable, twitches and shifts of his weight from one foot to the other in evidence as he flinches from the light ripple of applause which greets him as he comes out to the stage. If he tries to catch Josh's eye Josh misses it, and since he hasn't been able to look away from Toby's face except to blink since he came through the small, well-hidden door at the back of the shop, he thinks maybe Toby is trying to ignore specific parts of his audience, rather than just the body of them as a whole. He sinks a little further into his seat, but he doesn't stop staring. He sounds: soft as he starts, in imminent danger of breaking, his voice strained over the mic with explanations and short, fragmentary sentences that still sound like low music to Josh. In a matter of seconds there is a hush over the room, which is full of draughts and echoes and the noise of cab horns and tourists from without the doors, that has nothing to do with the volume of Toby's voice, or even its tones, but with its power. As he starts the reading of the book itself, as his voice slips into a passage which Josh has read every day this week and wondered about, it changes: its texture heavier, like the answers to important questions they hadn't even thought to ask yet. Josh finds himself sitting up straighter, leaning forward, straining his eyes.

" ... It is New York that his son comes to see, or so he thinks at first. Though when he was here Tom was always adamant that there was nowhere he hated more that New York and nowhere he felt more out of place, more clumsy, more different, Paul thinks perhaps his son loved the city too, even then; that a little part of Tom's heart belongs to parks and trees and the beach at Coney Island, where it always seemed to rain. So now that his son is older and Paul himself has entered the part of his life which is mostly composed of waiting for death, they still have the city. It is as incomprehensible, as ugly and deceptive, as relentlessly beguiling as they are themselves. Perfectly ours. And that's how the poem starts, how the cycle starts, how he starts to have something to say again."

The rest of the audience takes a moment before it reacts, in stutters, to the end of the passage. The sound of clapping and low whispers echo in the room. Josh watches him, up at the front, rubbing his thumb joint into his forehead, over and over. He can still hear Toby's breathing through the microphone. And he wants, urgently, to touch him; to still him.

*

It's a little hotel that in the past has seen them both eat dinner with senators and congressmen. Toby says it hasn't improved at all and Josh gulps out a laugh to agree. Josh reaches for his American Express card but Toby lays his fingers over Josh's arm and shakes his head. _It's gotta be my turn, right?_ and Josh can't argue with that expression, which begs not to be asked any difficult questions, not tonight. Toby takes his key and hands Josh his own which Josh pockets once they're out of sight of the concierge - it will be Toby's room, his money, his rules, and most likely his grief which form the order of business tonight. But Josh doesn't mind that - there's no way he could be this brave on his own initiative; fantasies mean nothing next to mind-numbing fear, after all.

"I'm sorry I never called when ... " Josh says, eventually, sitting on the bed and watching Toby remove his overcoat and jacket, roll up his sleeves.

Toby smiles, a sad far-off smile. "Don't worry about it."

"Toby, I -- "

He raises his palms; Josh stutters to a halt.

"I don't want to think about it, Josh. Okay?"

He nods, wants to disappear, wants to forget as soon as he hears it the note of strained patience in Toby's voice. "Okay."

"_Fuck_."

Josh gets up. It's three or four steps over to where Toby is standing, with his arms braced and his knuckles white holding on to the back of the dressing table chair. Josh puts his fingers against the white streaks in Toby's beard, strokes there, lets Toby's face turn in towards his hand. Then Josh is kissing him, both hands cupping Toby's face, pushed up against his body which seems five seconds behind his own - still reacting to the pass of Josh's fingers over his skin, holding his mouth open between kisses as though he is still waiting for something to fill it up. Toby's arms come up around Josh's back slowly and his fingers press into Josh's shoulders, pinching the skin underneath his collar, looking - Josh thinks - for some kind of concrete sensation. Toby tears away Josh's tie, unbuttons his shirt (three buttons, no more) with shaky fingers and pushes Josh's head back, gently, to expose his throat, which he throws himself down on - wet, hungry kisses. Josh winces and fists his hands in Toby's shirt to keep himself from crying out.

"I don't know how to do this," he says, when Toby lets him go. They are both breathing heavily, two pairs of eyes bloodshot, pupils blown. Toby's bottom lip is wet, glistening. Josh reaches out to touch it with the tips of his fingers; Toby turns his hand away, but gently.

"I do," he says, quietly.

He fucks the same way he commands - in terse phrases, rhythmic, demanding, and eccentric. He pushes Josh up against the bedhead - flattening his cheek against the wall - and enters him hard and matter-of-fact. It hurts on the first few strokes, then becomes easier as muscles relax and as, once, the head of Toby's cock slams against Josh's prostate. But his hands, his fingers, are gentle. He rubs the length of Josh's cock inside the soft curve of his palm, closes his fingers over the head and strokes it and while he does so murmurs words which Josh can't catch but which sound ... loving. He comes first with a stifled cry but he stays inside Josh, rocking against him, increasing the pressure with which he jerks Josh off. And when Josh comes, with more abandon and less dignity than he had hoped, Toby wraps his arms around him and kisses his neck and the lobe of his ear.

Sleep comes quickly for Toby, less so for Josh. The bed feels hard and unfamiliar in a bad way and the sounds of Toby's breathing get into his dreams. But he does sleep, with his arm pressed along the length of Toby's back.

During the night, Josh wakes and finds Toby curled tight around himself, his breathing once more heavy and strained. For a few minutes Josh watches his back rise and fall in short, pained waves, then he starts to stroke there, over and over, down the centre of Toby's spine.

Josh has no children yet, and the way it's going right about now he's not sure he'll ever get that son and heir his own father would have loved so much, so he doesn't understand - not really - the expression on Toby's face when he turns round. He laughs - a little chuckle that bubbles up in his throat. Toby saying without the words: _I know it's stupid, I know he's gone, but I can't stop_ and all Josh can do is shake his head, put his fingers into Toby's beard again, stroke his thumb around the curve of Toby's mouth. They kiss, for a moment, until Toby pulls away. His eyes are wet and all Josh can hear in his head is the little voice that tells him to run away from situations like this; denial and an unhealthy work ethic - the only good routes out of the disaster he always makes out of any personal relationship. He glances up at Toby - and sees the expression of a not entirely unrelated feeling on his face. Josh laughs, or gulps some air in and back out again; same difference. Toby smiles that sad, broken smile again. He takes hold of Josh's hand, knits their fingers together, squeezes. Josh stares at their hands, and when he looks back up again, Toby is asleep, breathing softly.

*

"What did he want to be, when he grew up?"

"It changed a lot. I forbade him to become a writer at least once a week though. I'm not sure it would have helped, in the end."

"I never wanted to be a lawyer."

"You wanted ballet lessons."

"Sam told you?"

"Sam told me."

"Of all the sneaking ... "

Toby chuckles. Josh smiles.

"He liked you," Toby says, softly. Josh almost misses the words under the noise of a particularly loud truck out in the street. "He'd never speak to the President, but he'd get this ... _look_. I had to prise the Fables of Phaedrus out of his hands one time. Loving CJ is possibly a genetic trait in my family. And ... he didn't ... he never _liked_ Sam. There wasn't enough ... time." Toby stops there, takes a gulp of coffee, twists a packet of sweetener which he has no intention of using around in a circle between his fingers. "But he liked you."

Josh doesn't know what to say to that, to any of it. He stares down at the Starbucks napkin, then back up into Toby's eyes. They are dry, sharp, bright.

"He appreciated the baseball coaching. Apparently I couldn't throw worth a damn."

Josh smiles. "I liked him too."

Toby nods. Josh lets out, as quietly as he can, a pent-up breath of air. He feels like he has been holding it in for a week.

*

The book - a second copy - arrives by FedEx at the West Wing the following week. Donna hands it over with a quizzical look but Josh puts it in the bottom drawer of his desk and doesn't touch it until the office is half-empty, that evening. He's reading it, or rather reading the inscription, when Sam knocks on the door.

"Is that what I think it is?" he asks, quietly.

"He asked me ... well, no he didn't ask me. But he didn't ... he didn't want to make a fuss. I'm sorry, man."

Sam shakes his head. "No, it's okay. I understand. It's Toby, you know?"

"Yeah."

"We ... we've written, a little, since ... "

"Yeah."

"Yeah."

He stands in the doorway a few seconds longer, then comes in and takes the seat on the other side of the desk.

"Is it good?"

"_Yeah_," Josh says.

Sam smiles a small, proud smile. "The Barnes and Noble on 12th and E is open for another half an hour. You want to come, get some coffee with me?"

Josh nods. "Get your coat, I'll be there in a second."


End file.
